Forgotten
by Izzu
Summary: Black. In the end, everything turned out well. Yet, Leo couldn't help feeling that there was something amiss.
1. Amiss

izzu: Well, this is written so that I could make sense of the ending. But don't expect me to be finishing this up too soon cos I still need to reorganize my thoughts on the plot.

* * *

Ever since he watched Ha-ram ran out of the station in a distraught state he had been feeling anxious. Should he chase after her? He _did_ promise 444 that he'll protect Ha-ram in his place. But if he ran off now... then what excuse he should give to Leo's manager? And he can't teleport–if he could still do it, 444 mentioned before that the more they become human they'd lose the ability to teleport–without anyone noticing, especially since Leo's a star. His sudden disappearance would've caused a stir...

"Gwi-nam, start the car already. We need to be there when the helicopter and rescue team arrive!"

'Leo' turned around as he saw Captain Bong and his team rushed out as he immediately rushed towards them.

"Captain Bong–!"

The older man turned towards him in a hurry. "Oh, Leo! What is it, we're in a hurry. Han Moogang–!"

"Just now I saw Miss Ha-ram running out in a hurry, So I was worried... this something happened–?"

Detective Oh and Detective Park paused before turning towards each other. "Miss Ha-ram?", Detective Park exclaimed, immediately realising something as he grabbed Captain Bong. "She did hear about which cliff Moogang should have jumped from... _right_? Would you think she could...?"

Captain Bong slapped Park's head with his hand. "Of course she did! And you two had been crying so much after that that we barely noticed that she ran out! Now what mess do we have here?" he snapped, before shoving his subordinates into the car. He turned towards Leo. "Don't worry, we'll watch out for any signs of her there as well!"

Then the car drove off, leaving 'Leo' behind. He sighed.

That's it. That's all he could do for now.

xxx

He finished the filming of a victim interrogation scene at the hospital as the horrid feeling he's been feeling in his stomach did not subside. And as if he doesn't already have enough concerns in his mind. There's also that concern about his drama's likelihood to be boycotted by fans because of the scandal with Leo's father. And even if the man had already died, it wasn't as if the sentiment would die anytime soon.

 _Ah... he really needs to figure out how to solve this issue._

"Make way! Emergency patient getting through!"

'Leo' stopped himself as he darted towards the hospital's main entrance. _Wait_ , he frowned, were those _Detective Han's teammates? So that could mean...!_

He turned to the direction of the emergency hospital staff before heading towards Captain Bong. Before he could even say a word, the captain spoke.

"We managed to rescue Miss Ha-ram. She tried to kill herself as well by jumping off the cliff but we saved her just in time. We still didn't manage to find Detective Han's body though. The rest of the recovery team were still at Moojin cliff to look for him."

 _Was that it?_ , Je Soo-dong asked in his mind. _What about 444's body? It was there as well under the seabed, wasn't it?_

He wanted to ask those questions so bad yet he couldn't say it out loud without turning people's head. But then, Detective Oh came over.

"Sir, I'll get back to the location to oversee the recovery of the unidentified body in the car we found earlier," the man said before Captain Bong dismissed him.

"Unidentified body?" Je Soo-dong asked, as Captain Bong turned to face him.

"Yes, we managed to find a very old car, deep under the seabed overlooking Moojin cliff with a body inside. The recovery team was still in the process of taking it out as we speak. Supposedly, the body should be of the child that Moogang's mother claimed to have killed to save Moogang. His supposed older 'brother'. But I don't remember Detective Han mentioning that he had an older brother before... so that was odd. Guess, figuring out the identity of the unidentified body would be our next case..."

Captain Bong waved him off as he went towards the hospital's administration office as Je Soo-dong was left perplexed.

What did Captain Bong mean about an 'unidentified' body? He thought he remembered hearing them talking about Kim Joon before, so they should have been aware of him... 444 being Detective Han's older brother. What did they mean that they don't know _who_ Kim Joon was?

xxx

A few days passed, and he's been paying close attention to the news for any mentions of the teen prostitution scandal news as well as the Moojin Time Mart scandal incident. But since most of the involved parties were deceased, the prosecution would not hold a trial over the incident but instead, have the results of the investigation be released to the public. Well, that's good... probably, since at least everything that 444 had done to unearth the truth of that incident would not be in vain.

Yet there was something that Je Soo-dong started to notice. Despite the details of the investigations have been made public, there was _no mention_ in the press about anything regarding Kim Joon. Or even about the murder of Kim Joon or how it relates to the investigation of the Moojin cases. That puzzled him, since that reminded him of how Captain Bong and the others seemed to not remember anything about Kim Joon.

 _Something's not right_ , he thought. And now that he thought about it, it's time for him to visit Kang Ha-ram at the hospital. She should be well enough now to be able to accept visitor and he needed to confirm about some important matters himself.

* * *

Also, the whole scenario of this short would be based on this.

"The story of a grim reaper, Black who gets erased from the memories of the world for breaking the rules of heaven and falling in love with a mortal woman, Kang Ha Ram after inhabiting a human body."

The description said that Black was erased from the 'memories' of the world, not that he was erased completely from the world so I'm going to follow that theme. Thanks for reading.


	2. Erased

When he arrived at the hospital room Kang Ha-ram was already receiving some visitors. There's her mother... and then there's Oh Mansoo. He carefully let himself inside while trying to not act too out of character towards them. He smiled awkwardly at Ha-ram.

"Err... hello. It's been a while, Miss Ha-ram," he turned towards Mansoo. "She all right, is it? I've been so busy with filming so I didn't manage to come visit and I heard the news..."

Mansoo shrugged. "Well, you can see her now... right?"

Leo sighed. "That's good to hear. I thought she would _still_ be distraught after what happened to Detective Han."

He turned to smile at Kang Ha-ram as the young woman stared at him blankly.

"Detective... Han?" Ha-ram spoke softly.

Leo frowned. "Miss Ha-ram, w-what're you talking a—what?"

Without warning, Oh Mansoo dragged him out of the room before he could say anything more.

xxx

Oh Mansoo was glaring at him angrily the moment they were out of the room. "You idiot! You should watch your mouth before you say anything stupid!"

He blinked. Puzzled. "What did you mean? Am I not supposed to say anything about Detective Han in front of Miss Ha-ram?"

Mansoo made a face at him. "Yes! Because Ha-ram no longer remembers anything about him. So you shouldn't do anything to make her remember that person. It's better for her, she seemed better now anyway."

Je Soo-dong gave him a surprised look. "Wait. What did you mean that Miss Ha-ram don't remember who Detective Han is? What happened?"

Mansoo glared at him as if he was asking about something ridiculous. "She lost all of her memories prior to her jumping off the cliff. And right now I'm trying to help her out with her current situation." Mansoo hissed to himself. "Why on earth that Detective Han had to do something so stupid? After all his hard work to solve the Moojin Time Mart case and scandal, to end his life like that over some random unknown kid... I just don't get him."

His 'friend' shook his head in frustration before heading back into the room. Je Soo-dong stopped him.

"Wait, what did you mean about a 'random kid'?"

Mansoo made a face at him. "You said you've listened to those news reports, right? I'm talking about some random kid that was mentioned in Detective Han's mother's suicide note. Ish, I don't get that guy..."

Je Soo-dong remained frozen as Mansoo got back into Ha-ram's hospital room. He still couldn't process what he just heard.

A random kid? Yet another instance where any trace of Kim Joon disappeared from someone's memory just to be replaced by a vague description of a 'boy' that everyone seemed to not be able to remember. What does this mean? Why did everyone forget about Kim Joon yet _he_ still remembered him?

 _"Whoa, this is strange... and mysterious! I get the whole memories being erased thing... but Ha-ram even lost the ability to see us! How did that happen?"_

Je Soo Dong turned his head towards the voices as he saw two grim reapers walking past Ha-ram's room. He could recognise the grim reaper who was clad in a black Joseon-period attire as Grim Reaper 007, but he didn't recognize the other. Although the style of the other grim reaper did look familiar to him. Je Soo-dong kept staring at them as the younger grim reaper kept peeking in and out of Kang Ha-ram's room. He watched as 007 kept hitting the other with his fan.

 _"Well, if she could still see us... wouldn't that mean that she could still remember 444's existence then? Even if Ha-ram wasn't aware that Kim Joon was 444_ , _if she still had that eye ability of hers, she could still cause more disruption in the future. So, of course, the High Council wouldn't let this matter pass. Other than the punishment sentenced on 444, memories of everyone who knows about Ha-ram's abilities were also erased. So now, even the mother didn't remember anything about the previous 444. So she wouldn't remember that her daughter had the ability to see the shadows of death."_

xxx

Reaper 007 slapped Jang Hyunsoo with his fan again. "Forget about that... but aren't you finally going to heaven now? Everything has settled on this plane now, you should already leave this world!"

Hyunsoo shook his head. "I already said that I'm going to do so when 444 could return to heaven as well! But now that things turned out like this... unh, wait. 444's still around in the Underworld, isn't it? Does that mean that he could still resume his grim reaper's duty then? Would his soul still be able to leave for heaven once his punishment ended? Would his punishment ever end? Also... isn't 444 the grim reaper assigned to pick up Ha-ram's soul when she died? What'll happen to her when she died for real? Would 444 be able to complete his duty or would other reapers be sent instead?"

007 hit Hyunsoo's head again angrily. "Aah! You got too many questions! Can't you already leave my side now? My duty was not to babysit you and your duty as a grim reaper has already ended when your body was found. So why are you not leaving?"

"I told you already that I–" Hyunsoo paused as his attention turned towards Leo. "007... is it just me, or did that human just stared at us all these times?"

007 turned to look towards Leo as well. "Well, I'd be... let's go!"

The two grim reapers hastily left the corridors as Leo gave chase.

xxx

The moment he got to the emergency stairs, Je Soo-dong hurriedly close the doors behind him.

"Wait!" he hollered towards the fleeing grim reapers, "I wanted to know too! What happened to 444? Why is everyone forgetting about him? Forgetting the fact that he still existed?"

The two grim reapers froze just as they're about to teleport away through the door on the floor below. 007 and the other 'younger' reaper turned around to face him. And for some reason, Je Soo-dong suddenly recalled that 007 had been paired to 416 the last time he saw them. _Would that young one be 416?_

"Y–you can see us? W-wait... how did you even know 444?" 416 started to say.

007 also was about to say something but then he stopped himself, as if just remembering a memory. "You... by any chance, are you 444's partner that ran away before?"

416 turned his attention towards his older reaper partner. "444's partner? You mean that 'loser' that Black's had constantly been chasing after?" The young reaper turned his attention back towards Je Soo-dong. "Oh My Gosh! The loser's here! In plain sight! BAM!" he exclaimed before making a pose.

 _Yeah, that's definitely 416..._

Alarms shot inside his head as Je Soo-dong hastily cried out. "Don't call the Death Squad on me yet! 444 made me promise that I'll look after Ha-ram before letting me go. I can't do that if you take me back!" He paused, when he realized that neither 007 and 416 were going to do anything to him. He looked up.

"Unh... back to what you two were talking about, what happened to 444?"

416 glanced towards 007 as the Joseon-clad reaper let out a cough. "The High Council sentenced him to the maximum sentence for breaking heaven's rule. Instead of dissipation, his existence would be erased from the memories of the world. No one in this world besides us grim reapers would have _any_ memories of him ever existing."

Je Soo-dong blinked. "Erased? B-but... he still _existed_ , right? I mean, that body that was found in the sea... that's him, right? I mean, if he's gone... if Kim Joon never existed, 444 wouldn't even... heck I shouldn't even be able to stay inside Leo's body right now—!"

007 simply nodded silently. He gave 416 an irritated glance, as the shorter reaper kept tugging on his sleeves.

"After a while, he'll most likely be allowed to resume his grim reaper's duties. But he'll be in an even stricter monitoring now that the Council knows what he's capable of if left unchecked." 007 turned to face both 416 and Je Soo-dong. "And as for whether or not 444 would be allowed to collect Kang Ha-ram's soul later when she died or if he could go to heaven, that's up to God's will to forgive his sins. And I should ask both of you to leave the matter as is. It's not for us to decide or question."

Je Soo-dong sighed. "I guess you're right," he started to say before a door slammed open behind him. He turned around in surprise as Oh Mansoo appeared in front of him.

"Hey, Leo! What're you doing here? Ha-ram even started wondering where you've gone!"

xxx

Hyunsoo started laughing before a thought crossed his mind.

"Hey... come to think. If the loser is still inside that body, what happened to Leo's real soul?" he said aloud. 007 gasped as both of them turned their glance towards Je Soo-dong, just as Mansoo dragged him away.


	3. Missing Piece

"Take your time... you're not in any hurry..." said the older woman whom he deduced earlier as being Kang Ha-ram's mother, as she watched her daughter eat her lunch. Je Soo-dong continued staring at the woman.

Come to think, he did somewhat have met her before when he had been hospitalized in this same hospital before. Strange to think that this old woman was the mother of Kang Ha-ram, who used to be connected to Han Moo-gang, who was possessed by 444 and used to be his partner grim reaper. Not to mention how Leo used to know 444 back when 444 was still alive. Strange how everyone seemed to be connected by this invisible thread...

"Uhm... is there something wrong?" Ha-ram's mother started asking him as Je Soo-dong hastily apologized to her. He turned his attention towards Ha-ram.

 _She seemed like a different person now_ , he silently mused. But then a flash of memory came back into his mind.

 _"You'll get yourself killed if you keep doing this. He's a brutal serial killer. How can people like you catch people like him?"_

 _"Do you want me to just sit back and watch? It'll be just as stressful sitting around here not doing anything! If I hadn't saved his life twice, Lee Miso wouldn't have died."_

Wait. Why did he start recalling about that conversation now? Why did he never question it before? When the situation had been strange from the very beginning.

Back then, despite being just a _normal_ civilian girl... Ha-ram had been acting as if she was part of the investigation team. No, she had acted as if she was a police detective herself! And for some reason Detective Han—no, 444—allowed that girl to drag him around to do her biddings. When that man was never the type to do that when he was still the fearsome grim reaper in the Underworld.

At what point did he stop wondering about that particular exchange? At what point did he just... accept the things he heard and saw without question?

Oh. Was it because of that time when he finally found out that 444 was inside Han Moogang that he stopped thinking about the things that Ha-ram spoke before? Come to think, since then a lot of things have happened too.

 _"...Ha-ram even lost the ability to see us!"_

Je Soo-dong let out a gasp without thinking.

"Leo? Is there something wrong with you? You've been in a daze for a while now..."

He blinked and turned to face Oh Mansoo. He blinked again. "Oh? Sorry... I've been having too many thoughts running inside my head just now..."

"Leo must be tired... after all of his drama shootings," Ha-ram started to say as Je Soo-dong turned his attention towards her.

What was this nagging feeling that he started to sense? Was there something that he overlooked? He got up from his chair, preparing to leave.

"Ah! Sorry. I... I think I should go home and rest."

Mansoo patted his arm on the side. "It's okay, man... get some rest," said the man in passing as Je Soo-dong recalled something.

There was a time, not too long ago before his not-quite intentional act of suicide... when Leo and his two friends got caught in yet another problem. He thought he remembered a few stray conversation between Leo and Oh Mansoo that he used to dismiss. Back when he was picking up Leo from the station. It was something that he never fully bothered to recall before since that was also around the same time that Leo caused another problem outside the station which eventually led to him being dead due to his own stupidity.

 _"... Miss Psychic..."_

"Ah!" he gasped again before turning around to head back, only to see that Man-soo was already behind him. Tailing him since he walked out of the Ha-ram's room. "Ah, Mansoo! W... why, have you been following me?"

Mansoo just shrugged. "I was just concerned. You're okay... right? I mean, what with Detective Han's suicide, his mother's... and I think I heard there's another doctor from this hospital found dead at his office... and then there's Ha-ram too, I can't help worrying. And you've been acting weird lately, so..."

"I'm fine. It's just..." He might as well use this chance to ask him, "Mansoo... do you remember anything about a psychic that you've met in the past? I think I remembered you mentioning it before..."

The man just stared at him blankly. "A psychic? What're you talking about, Leo? Don't start going weird on me like Detective Han did before. I mean, there was this time before he started shouting about 'getting out of his house'. There was no one in the house beside me and him, yet he said he wasn't talking to me. And then you see, Detective Han did that... _thing_. So, don't _you_ start going weird on me now."

Je Soo-dong tried to laugh it off. "Oh, I'm just asking... must have mistaken it for someone else's word. See ya later..." he said before dashing towards the elevators.

The moment that he was sure that he's outside Mansoo's line of sight, he immediately teleported himself away from the hospital.


End file.
